US Attacked Iraq Based On False Report Of Saddam Hussein's Ties To Al Qaeda: Sen. Carl Levin

The George W. Bush administration misled the American public by relying on an unconfirmed report claiming links between Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda to justify the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, according to Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., and chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Speaking on the Senate floor, Levin brought up a 2003 CIA cable that warned the former president and his officials not to make references to allegations that Mohammad Atta -- the Egyptian hijacker who led the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks -- had met with an Iraqi intelligence officer named Ahmad al-Ani in Prague before 9/11, which killed 2,996 people and cost the U.S. at least $10 billion in property and infrastructure damage. Levin accused the Bush administration of using the report of the unconfirmed meeting to justify the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

“There was a concerted campaign on the part of the Bush administration to connect Iraq in the public mind with the horror of the Sept. 11 attacks. That campaign succeeded. According to public polls in the week before the Iraq war, half or more of Americans believed Saddam was directly involved in the attacks,” Levin said, in a statement released Thursday.

http://www.ibtimes.com/us-attacked-iraq-based-false-report-saddam-husseins-ties-al-qaeda-sen-carl-levin-1750592